- Joan Hahn
- August 16, 2021
- Last Updated on
They say that being the best in a specific sport requires passion to get motivated. That may be true, but if you find out how much money a pro tennis player gets, you will probably burn yourself with passion, to be like them.
So, really, how much do professional tennis players make? Let’s find out.
How Much Do Pro Tennis Players Make In A Year?
The top 5 players get around $7.5 million to 8 million a year. Ranked 5-10 get around $3 million to 3.5 million yearly.
Beyond those ranks gets lower rates.
Only players ranked 1-50 have the sweeter taste of victory when it comes to monetary value.
Younger players who are part of the top juniors are starting to climb and make a name for themselves as they can also join lower-level tournaments.
Closer Look at the Average Salary
Per Match
In a tournament, the player still earns money even if they do not emerge as the winner by playing matches.
The organizers come up with prize money for every round, and whichever round they reach, they get the corresponding prize starting from the first round.
The more matches they win, the more significant take-home money they bring with them.
Before the tournament starts, the organizers will announce how much they will be getting per level, and they will be getting the same amount as these are flat rates for each round they win.
Let’s cover the total prize money for the top tiers for this year, 2021.
- Top 1- 5 – around $110,000 to 114,000
- Top 5-10 – around $50,000 to 53,000
- Top 11-15 – around $33,000 to 36,000
- Top 16-20 – around $27,000 to 29,000
- Top 21-25 – around $23,000 to 25,000
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Per Tournament
On top of the prize money earnings, professional tournaments give out more money to the top tennis players.
Lower ranked players aspire to get to the next tier and play against the top for the prizes.
The rates differ depending on what professional tennis competitions this top-ranked player is joining.
These numbers we are showing are just estimated amounts for the tournament prize money they are getting from the tournament play itself, for this year alone.
- US Open – around $3,700,000 to 3,900,000
- Australian Open – around $2,800,000 to,3,000,000
- Wimbledon – around $2,800,000 to 3,000,000
- French Open/Roland Garros – around $2,400,000 to 2,600,000
- ATP 1000 – around $1,200,000 to 1,300,000
Top 5 Highest Paid Tennis Players of 2021
1. Roger Federer
This Swiss International is ranked nine among the world’s professional tennis players, but he is the highest-paid tennis player in 2021.
He has 103 career titles and 20 Grand Slams under his name.
No Men’s Tour for Federer this year because of an injury, but his lucrative endorsement deals with Credit Suisse, Nike, and Rolex.
He got a hefty sum of $52 million from his endorsement and another $4.2 million worth of prize money and has a total earning of $56.2 million this year.
His total net worth is $450 million, a lot more than any tennis player in the world.
See: Federer vs Williams
2. Rafael Nadal
Rafael “Rafa” Nadal Parera, from Spain, who, along with Roger Federer, holds 20 grand slam titles.
He has 86 titles in his entire career, 13 of which are from the French Open.
He is also known as the “king of clay courts.
He has sponsorship deals with big names like Mercedes-Benz, Gillette, Rolex, Mot, and Lindt.
These endorsement deals amounted to $30 million-plus and won 14.5 million in tournaments, giving him a total income of $44.5 million just for the year 2021.
His net worth is $200 million.
3. Novak Djokovic
Novak is from Serbia, and currently, he is ranked number 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals.
He has a total of 81 titles in his tennis career.
The companies linked to him are Audemars Piguet, FitLine, Sergio Tacchini, and Mercedes-Benz, which gave him $21 million this year.
Add to that his prize money of $12.1 million.
Ranked one among all pro tennis players in the world got $33.1 million just for this year. His net worth is 220 million dollars.
4. Li Na
Li Na is from Wuhan, China, and has already retired from the world of tennis and is now somehow an average person.
The 39-year old retired last 2004 but managed to snatch 9 WTA Tour singles titles.
She was one of the top-ranked players in 2014. She was ranked two during the year she retired.
She no longer participates in tournaments, but her endorsements give her more than enough.
She gets $18 from her endorsements from Mercedes-Benz, Nike, Samsung Electronics, and Rolex.
Her estimated net worth is $60 million.
5. Serena Williams
She started being a professional tennis player at the age of 14, way back in 1995, her decent living years.
Her 25 years playing tennis got her 39 Grand Slams and over $90 million in prize money.
As expected, her fortune is not dependent on tournaments like other players ranked.
She has product endorsements Audemars Piguet, Gatorade, Pepsi, Wilson, Aston Martin, Beats by Dre, IBM, Nike, Intel and Chase, and other companies.
Her reported net worth, according to Forbes, is $210 million.
FAQS
They earn by getting the prize money in tennis tournaments and bonuses, just like most tennis players. But the top players earn more during exhibition games and get paid with appearance fees as the tournament’s main draw. They get money from sponsorships and club tennis deals as well.
There may be tremendous opportunities when you go professional, but being on ATP’s Top 50 costs a lot. You might be shocked by the cost of a tennis racquet’s string(1).
Below is the list of approximate expenses that a professional player has to spend for every tournament.
- Tennis coach: around $1.2 to 1.6 million
- Training: around $220,000 to $240,000
- Travel: around $130,000 to $150,000
- Food: around $20,000 to $30,000
- Stringing and racquet customization: around $30,000 to $40,000
- Other miscellaneous costs: around $30,000 to $50,000
Key Takeaways
Top pro tennis players make millions, but we are only talking about big names who made it to the finals of the U.S open, like Maria Sharapova, Jack Sock, and the likes.
There are only a small number of players in pro tennis who earn that much. Some higher-ranked players only do exhibition matches during WTA Tours. They get compensated for referring traffic and business to the tournament because of that one match.
Lower ranked players do not have these luxuries, but the sport has its benefits if you strive hard. After all, they did not make it to the top in just one day.
References:
- http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~cross/
